VOLPE SENTENCED TO A 30-YEAR TERM IN LOUIMA TORTURE

By JOSEPH P. FRIED

Published: December 14, 1999

After tearfully pleading for mercy and apologizing to his victim, Justin A. Volpe was sentenced yesterday to 30 years in prison for brutalizing Abner Louima in a Brooklyn police station. The judge denounced the former officer for an ''unusually heinous'' crime that had harmed not only Mr. Louima, but also the Police Department and society at large.

''Short of intentional murder, one cannot imagine a more barbarous misuse of power than Volpe's,'' Judge Eugene H. Nickerson said in a packed courtroom in Federal District Court in Brooklyn, as he sentenced Mr. Volpe for a notorious act that drew national attention and fueled charges of police brutality against blacks in New York City. Mr. Louima is black and Mr. Volpe is white.

The sentence drew sharply mixed reactions. Federal prosecutors said they accepted it, although they had urged the judge to impose a life term. Mr. Volpe's lawyer and his father both called it too harsh, while Mr. Louima's supporters insisted that it was too lenient. Calling the sentence appropriate, Police Commissioner Howard Safir said, ''I hope this is a chapter in the history of the N.Y.P.D. that is behind us.''

For his part, Mr. Louima simply said, ''The sentence today, I hope, will send a clear message that no one is above the law.''

The former officer's sentence was less than the life in prison without parole that Judge Nickerson could have imposed. The judge said he decided on a lesser sentence in part because the former officer would probably have to be segregated from other inmates for his own protection, which could be considered additional punishment.

Mr. Volpe, 27, could be released after 25 years if he behaves well in prison. He has received credit for the six months he served since stopping his trial in May to plead guilty to violating Mr. Louima's civil rights. Mr. Volpe was also ordered to pay $277,495 in restitution to Mr. Louima, although Judge Nickerson acknowledged he would be unable to do so. The judge did not explain how he arrived at the figure, but directed Mr. Volpe to pay $25 a month.

Mr. Volpe admitted that he had jammed a broken broomstick into Mr. Louima's rectum in a police station bathroom, inflicting severe internal injuries on the 32-year-old Haitian immigrant, because he mistakenly believed that Mr. Louima had punched him in the head during a street brawl, knocking him down and causing him to fear for his life. It turned out that another man had punched Mr. Volpe. ''However frightened and angry he was, Volpe's response was wildly out of proportion,'' Judge Nickerson said.

In court yesterday, Mr. Louima described his terror and the injuries he suffered on the floor of the bathroom where he was assaulted in August 1997. He told the judge of the psychological pain he later endured when Mr. Volpe and his lawyer suggested that the injuries had come from a homosexual encounter before his arrest.

Mr. Volpe, paler and thinner than the hefty, muscular officer who was arrested more than two years ago, and wearing jail clothes that included trousers that had to be rolled up at the ankles because they were much too long, told Judge Nickerson, ''I was and still am ashamed and deeply regretful for what I did.''

He added, ''I betrayed Abner Louima's rights, I betrayed the city's confidence in police officers, I betrayed myself and my partners and I betrayed my lawyer.'' The last was a reference to his not having told his lawyer, Marvyn M. Kornberg, that he was guilty until the evidence had become overwhelming at his trial.

Mr. Volpe, who had been on the force for four years when he brutalized Mr. Louima, was dismissed immediately after his conviction. Frequently choking up as he stood before the bench, he said he had ''come to realize that this case goes beyond me and Abner Louima.'' Mr. Louima showed no emotion as he listened.

''What I did not only hurt Abner Louima and his family, but conjured up the worst fears in people,'' Mr. Volpe said. ''This fear was worsened by me being a police officer.''

Mr. Volpe also apologized to Patrick Antoine, another Haitian immigrant, whom he had assaulted on the street. As expected, Mr. Volpe also repeated his statements that another former officer, Charles Schwarz, had been wrongly convicted of helping to torture Mr. Louima by holding him down in the bathroom of the 70th Precinct station house. Mr. Volpe repeated his statement that the officer in the bathroom was Thomas Wiese. In the past, Mr. Volpe had said that Mr. Wiese merely watched the attack on Mr. Louima.

A prosecutor, Alan Vinegrad, told the judge that Mr. Volpe's statements exonerating Mr. Schwarz lacked credibility. Mr. Vinegrad, chief assistant United States attorney in Brooklyn, has said there was more than sufficient evidence to support the conviction of Mr. Schwarz, who faces up to life in prison. Mr. Schwarz plans to appeal his conviction. Mr. Schwarz, Mr. Wiese and a third former officer, Thomas Bruder, face trial next month on charges that they conspired to lie to investigators to convince them that Mr. Schwarz had not taken part in the torture. Defense lawyers have said they would call Mr. Volpe as a witness for their clients, who deny the charge.

In his sentence, Judge Nickerson modified a recommendation by the United States Probation Department, which said federal sentencing guidelines mandated life in prison without parole.

Rather, he said, he was taking into account such factors as the likelihood that the former police officer would have to serve much of his sentence in ''some form of segregation'' for his own protection from other inmates. He decided on a guideline that called for a sentence of between 30 years and life. He then imposed the 30 years, without further explanation.

A spokesman for the Federal Bureau of Prisons, Dan Dunne, said it was too early to say where Mr. Volpe would be incarcerated or what security precautions would be taken.

After the sentencing, Mr. Kornberg said he would appeal. He had told Judge Nickerson that 20 years would have been enough. Later, outside the courthouse, as Mr. Louima's supporters jeered him in the background, he mentioned that another officer, Francis X. Livoti, had been sentenced to seven and a half years in 1998 for violating a man's civil rights by killing him with an illegal choke hold in 1994. Mr. Volpe's father, Robert Volpe, a retired city police detective, said 30 years was as harsh as a life sentence.

The Rev. Al Sharpton said after leaving the courthouse that Mr. Volpe ''should have been given life.'' Vladimir Rodney, a chairman of the Haitian-American Alliance, called the sentence a ''slap on the wrist.''

But Loretta E. Lynch, the United States attorney in Brooklyn, said the 30 years was a result of a careful balancing by Judge Nickerson.

Photo: Abner Louima, flanked by his lawyer, Sanford A. Rubenstein, right, and the Rev. Al Sharpton, spoke to reporters yesterday after Justin A. Volpe, the former police officer who brutalized him, was sentenced. (Angel Franco/The New York Times)(pg. B5)